Scorching start propels Becker, Shuffield to Challenge Cup Championship Round

Matt Becker and Spencer Shuffield blistered the Chautauqua Lake bass to the tune of 99 pounds, 6 ounces during Thursday's second Knockout Round match. Photo by Phoenix Moore. Anglers: Matt Becker, Spencer Shuffield.

August 29, 2024 • Joe Opager • General Tire Team Series

ERIE, Pa. — For just about all the teams that advanced to the Knockout Round at the B&W Trailer Hitches Challenge Cup Presented by Toyota, the shift from Presque Isle Bay to Chautauqua Lake proved challenging. Five of the six tandems started slow across the past two days.

Matt Becker and Spencer Shuffield of Team B&W Trailer Hitches didn’t get the memo.

Self-nicknamed “the brownie boys” because of their affinity for chasing smallmouth, Becker and Shuffield quickly found an offshore school that contained both brown and green bass. In the opening period, they stacked 20 fish totaling 49 pounds, 7 ounces on SCORETRACKER®, most of them eating topwater lures. From there, they cruised to the win with 99-6 on 44 bass.

“Anytime you can catch smallmouth on topwater, it’s incredible,” Shuffield said. “We had an absolute blast today. I didn’t expect to catch as many 3 1/2- to 4-pounders, and I was really impressed with the caliber of fish here. I’d definitely take what we had today tomorrow and feel pretty good about it.”

Team B&W Trailer Hitches will be joined in the first Championship Round of the fall 2024 General Tire Team Series Presented by Bass Pro Shops by Luke Clausen and John Hunter of Team Smokey Mountain Herbal Snuff and Pouches. Clausen and Hunter found a honey hole of their own that produced 20 bass for 48-7 during the second period en route to totaling a stout 74-11. Team Coign (Drew Gill and Matthew Stefan) was eliminated.

Early topwater bite ignites huge day

Becker and Shuffield used a morning feeding frenzy to take an early lead and never looked back. Photo by Phoenix Moore

Originally hailing from Pennsylvania, Becker was one of the only anglers in the field with experience on Chautauqua Lake, and that experience paid off in a big way. He led the duo to a grass flat on the north end of the lake to start the morning, and they did most of their damage there.

“We caught a lot of fish in the morning — nearly half of our weight came off of that one flat,” Shuffield said. “We caught three or four smallmouth over 4 pounds, and that got us off to a really good start.”

Shuffield led the way with 27 bass totaling 63-8 on the day, including the Berkley Big Bass, a 4-15 smallmouth. Taking advantage of the low-light conditions early, his topwater of choice was a Yo-Zuri 3DB Pencil in sexy shad, which he threw on a 7-foot, 3-inch medium-heavy Ark Reinforcer rod with an Ark Gravity G8 reel spooled with 40-pound Yo-Zuri Super Braid line.

“I feel like the clouds really helped us out with the smallmouth in the morning,” added Becker, who chipped in 35-14 on 17 bass.

From there, Becker and Shuffield proceeded to hit more offshore grass as well as some shallow boat docks, all of which produced fish. Their weight and catch tallies both eclipsed the totals boated by all three teams combined on Wednesday.

“We whacked them today — that was such a fun day of fishing,” Becker said. “We got to go on a tour of Lake Chautauqua. We fished the north end, the south end and everywhere in between. We caught some on topwater, caught some under boat docks, caught some flipping — it was a hodgepodge. Cracking 5-pound smallmouth on topwater, man, what an awesome day.”

Becker and Shuffield will look to carry the momentum into Friday’s Championship Round. Even though they expect to compete on a different fishery, they’re feeling confident.

“We’ve got some momentum rolling, and I like our chances heading into the Championship Round tomorrow,” Becker said. “I don’t know where we’re going — probably somewhere completely new — but we are excited and looking forward to hopefully breaking down a new fishery.”

Stage set for Championship Round

The Challenge Cup will culminate Friday in a one-day shootout between the remaining four teams. Teams Star Tron (Bobby Lane and Jacob Wall) and U.S. Air Force (Stephen Browning and Anthony Gagliardi) will join B&W Trailer Hitches and Smokey Mountain on an undisclosed fishery with the Challenge Cup trophy and $40,000 on the line for the winning duo.

Watch all the Championship Round action on the MLFNOW! livestream from 7:30 a.m. to 2:30 p.m. at MajorLeagueFishing.com, the MLF and MyOutdoorTV (MOTV) apps and Rumble.